Good Tidings We Bring
by bluestargem
Summary: "You love Christmas," Theo says. "Why are you spending it here in some Muggle café instead?" "I used to love Christmas," Daphne counters. She doesn't say why./ Oneshot: Daphne/Theo, for Tournament Four of Fire the Canon's Fanfiction Tournaments and ladoftheknightley's School Subjects Competition (Astronomy category)


_A/N: For Tournament Four of the Fanfiction Tournament Competitions and the School Subjects Competition (Astronomy). Prompt was Christmas. _

**-:-**

**Good Tidings We Bring**

It's snowing.

That's the first thought that registers in Theodore Nott's head before he enters the Muggle café, escaping the snowfall by a mere few seconds. He surveys his surroundings with a flicker of customary disgust, but sighs. It's cold and snowing and almost dark outside, and he's just had a late day at the Ministry, having to work at _Christmas _too, so really, it's not his fault that the waft of freshly-made coffee and sickeningly cheery Christmas carols playing in the background make him relax reluctantly, despite not seeing a wizard or witch in sight.

Almost immediately however, he regrets ever entering this particular café. Because as he joins the line at the counter, the customer in front of him shifts and turns towards the display of cupcakes on the side, her wavy hair falling back from her face. And quite suddenly, he finds himself facing the shocked and very familiar eyes of one Daphne Greengrass.

-:-

Daphne and Theodore were perhaps the oddest pair to be seen at Hogwarts together, and yet there they would be: sitting at the dinner table, in class, in the Slytherin common room together. It became such a familiar sight that everyone forgot how odd it had been at first to see two such very different people being such good friends. After all, hadn't they grown up together since birth? So of _course_ Theodore would pick out his carrots from his dinner every day and give them to Daphne, because he was the pickiest eater anyone had ever seen, while Daphne was like a goat and ate anything; and of _course_ Theodore would carry Daphne's Transfiguration books all the way from the common room to class each morning for her, because Daphne never remembered – or cared – to take them, while Theodore was in the top three of their grade for almost every subject; and of _course_ Daphne would buy two Honeydukes cupcakes every time she visited Hogsmeade so she and Theodore didn't need to fight over only one.

Of _course_ they would do these things for each other – they were childhood friends after all. Longest friends. Best friends.

And of course – of _course_ – Theodore Nott would never have a crush on Daphne Greengrass, his best female friend, who never even blinked whenever she walked in on Theo naked whilst he was changing in the boy's dormitories.

But it just so happened that he did.

-:-

"I _love _Christmas," he heard her say once to her sister, as they painted their toenails by the common room fire. "I absolutely _love _it, Astoria!"

Astoria merely rolled her eyes. "So you've said, for the thousandth time today."

Daphne clasped her hands in fervent glee. "All the snow, and the lights, and how everyone just comes together once a year to celebrate it without any trouble – I mean, everyone's all about peace and happiness at Christmas – and of course, the _presents," _she added with a smirk, before her smile wore off slightly. "Except, _Merlin, _that idiot Theo ruined it this year."

Astoria rolled her eyes again. "So you've said for the thousandth time today as well."

"I'm sick of him," Daphne continued, oblivious to Astoria's exasperation. "So, so, sick of him. I can't _believe_ he forgot to buy Weird Sisters' new album for me. I _told_ him I wanted to get it _immediately_, and that that was the most important thing I was looking forward to on Christmas this year, but he said he forgot! And then he had the nerve to tell me that their music was crap and not worth it anyway and _then _he went on about his usual rant about how Christmas was all about consumerism or whatever -"

"You shouldn't get angry at him," Astoria said, ever the more mature younger sister. "You realise he does so much for you when he never bothers for anyone else?"

Daphne gave a snort of disbelief. "He never does anything that's out of his way," she huffed. She wriggled her freshly-painted toenails beside the fire to dry them, muttering almost absent-mindedly now. "Never. Merlin, he has the most annoying habits. Now I'm completely and utterly _sick_ of him."

In his shadowed corner of the common room, Theo swallowed, his fingers clenching over the polished cover of the newest Weird Sisters album. Daphne would never know how those thoughtless words had hurt him that day; that day when he spent the entire morning and afternoon scouring the catalogue for the album in compensation for ruining her favourite day of the year in a moment of impatient anger, paying an exorbitant amount of money to have it delivered by express immediately instead of the usual three days just so she could receive it on time. There would always be a lingering bitterness and a certain fear from what she said that day – _I'm sick of him_ – no matter how brightly she had smiled when he had given her the album later that night, or how exuberantly she had hugged him and claimed that he "really was the _bestest _friend anyone could ever have."

-:-

"You love Christmas," Theo says a little hoarsely, trying to battle away his awkwardness with small talk. They're sitting at a table by the window after having ordered one coffee, one hot chocolate and two cupcakes, coupled with Daphne's suggestion to 'catch up with each other'. "Why are you spending it here in some Muggle café instead?"

"I _used _to love Christmas," Daphne counters, sipping her hot chocolate.

She doesn't say why.

-:-

"Theo!" Daphne pounced on his back as he walked down the Charms corridor with an armful of library books, deep in his calculations about how much he could read over the Christmas holidays in preparation for the OWLs. Once again, the third year in a row, his father had written to him that it was "more convenient" if Theo stayed at Hogwarts for the holidays due to "work issues".

"OW!" he yelled, dropping his books as he bent forwards with her weight. She leapt off gracefully, laughing in her teasing, roguish way.

"Mum wants you over for Christmas with Tracey," she said cheerfully, waving a piece of paper that was presumably a letter from Mrs Greengrass. "She said she thinks you're too skinny and is making you your favourite chicken salad, but she _insists _that you don't pick out the celery this time."

Theodore straightened, rubbing his back and wincing. "You could've said that without jumping on my back," he muttered irritably, but he felt a secret well of joy bubbling up unwillingly inside him at the fact that perhaps he wouldn't be spending his Christmas holed up in the Slytherin boys' dormitories again.

Daphne merely laughed again and slapped his back, eliciting another yelp from him. "Don't be such a baby, Theo," she cooed, patting him on the head patronisingly. He flicked her forehead chidingly in response and she made a face, before promptly drawing away.

"By-ye! See you at Transfiguration!" she sing-songed, waggling her fingers at him, and skipped away to catch up to the rest of her friends.

He sighed, rubbing his back absently as he wondered if he would ever get any OWL reading done at the Greengrasses. But it was with an increased amount of cheer and smiles that he and Tracey came over to Daphne's House at the start of the Christmas holidays, bearing a pile of homework and gifts, who welcomed them with an impulsive hug in her cosy kitchen. Theodore always loved to visit the Greengrasses during the summer holidays, who lived only three blocks away from the impressively intimidating Nott Mansion, and were as different a family to any other Pureblood family as could be. The Greengrasses had a definite and acknowledged calibre within the elite Pureblood society, but their prestige had declined over the years relative to their waning wealth, no longer comparable to families such as the Malfoys, and of course, the Notts. It resulted in being treated with an air of vague condescension, which Mr and Mrs Greengrass ignored, Astoria quietly defied, and Daphne treated with ignorant dismissal.

"Theo dear, you've grown so skinny," Mrs Greengrass said in her disapproving motherly tone, even though Theodore could've sworn he hadn't lost any weight since the beginning of the school year when she'd last seen him. "It's a good thing I made a whole tub of chicken salad for you and Tracey."

"Mum, he's still as stick skinny as he was when he was twelve," Daphne said with a roll of her eyes. "C'mon Tracey, let's go to my room," she added, pulling Tracey out of the kitchen with her luggage.

"Daphne, help Theo to his room too!" Mrs Greengrass called after her, but Daphne merely shouted back exasperatedly, "He _knows_ where he's staying, Mum! He always stays over!"

Mrs Greengrass simply sighed, exchanging a look with Theo, who smiled back. He could hear the two girls laughing and talking cheerily as they bounded upstairs to the second floor, blending with the crackling and clattering noises of Mrs Greengrass' cooking. The faint murmurings of the radio in the living room mingled with Mr Greengrass' roaring laughter as the radio announcer cracked a joke, while the sound of Astoria coaxing her cat to roll over drifted inside from the open balcony door. And standing there in the kitchen, Theo felt himself relax instantly, for the first time that year.

It felt like Christmas. It felt like home.

-:-

"So, um…" Theo fades away, feeling very shamefully like a fifteen-year-old schoolboy again as he rubs his neck nervously. Daphne has him fixed in his chair with a cool, steady gaze, her arms crossed, silent.

"Maybe I should go…" he gestures vaguely with his hand to the café exit. Daphne's gaze lands on the untouched coffee cup in front of him pointedly, and Theo automatically withdraws his hand and picks up the cup obediently to drink it. He cringes belatedly at the reaction.

"Why have you been avoiding me for the past three years?" Daphne asks abruptly.

Theo closes his eyes and curses the moment he ever decided to step foot into this café.

-:-

It was their nineteenth and last Christmas together when Theo decided quite certainly that this would be the year that he would confess to Daphne _everything_. The phrase _I'm sick of him _haunted him constantly as he noticed that she wasn't around him as much anymore, that she had a life that sometimes didn't include him now, that she slowly seemed to be slipping out of his grasp.

It was snowing the Christmas day when he sought her out for a drink at the Leaky Cauldron. For a moment, they merely sat there awkwardly, his mind drawing a blank at what to say. How had their friendship come to this? Once upon a time, they had _always _had something to say to each other, no matter the time or the circumstances.

"Stephen Cornfoot just asked me out," Daphne stated. She smiled, and in the second that her laughing eyes met his, he felt an overwhelming rush of sadness and nostalgia and a strange, vicious affirmation of the end of their friendship. "Best Christmas _ever, _much?! What do you think?"

"I like you," he blurted instead. "I've liked you for the past five years. What do you want me to think?"

He stood up and left.

-:-

It's snowing.

"I don't-" he begins, but falters. "Does it matter?" he asks instead.

They're standing outside the café, having just paid the bill. Night has fallen already and the streets outside are empty save for the snowflakes twirling their leisurely way to the ground.

She nods. There's a pause, and then -

"Don't you ever wonder what my answer was?"

He laughs a little bitterly. "Not really. You told me afterwards you wanted to stay as friends. I told you that a guy who's confessing to an unrequited love wouldn't really want to stay as friends with said love." He snorts and folds his arms, turning to look at the streetlights and their glowing pools of warmth. "What, did you really mean 'I like you too'? I don't think so."

The silence tenses minutely however, and he turns back to her slowly. "You…didn't, right?"

She stares at him, and then in that bold, brash way of hers that he loves, she says, "yes, I did."

She steps forward in front of him, spreading out her hands to catch the falling snowflakes. "I still really like the Christmas snow, even if I don't like Christmas much anymore," she murmurs thoughtfully. She turns back to him casually. "I still feel the same about you too."

And on Theo's twentieth Christmas together with Daphne, when there is the re-affirmation that his friendship has ended with her, and the new affirmation that his love has just started with her, he feels that, just like her, Christmas has become his favourite day of the year.

-:-

_A/N:_ _And this is the quickest I have ever written a fanfic, so apologies for the…um, badness. This really didn't come out the way I wanted it to, but oh well. Please do review. :D_


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